Raising our backyard flock

My name is LeAnn, and my nearly 9 year old son, Samuel is raising our backyard chickens, in part for the fun, but also as a 4H project. We started by inheriting chickens from a neighbor who found them to be too much work (really??) and we just this past week decided to add to our mis-matched flock by adding 3 Australorp chicks and 3 Buff Orpington chicks. They are living in the house in a large dog crate under the heat lamp. The 3 other chickens that we have are survivors after we had a brutal raccoon attack that took our half of our flock. We have a blue cochin who is surviving despite a bad bite, a Rhode Island Red, and a third bird that we think may be a Wyandotte?

A couple of questions for those who are more experienced than we...we've read that Cochins have great mothering skills - is it too soon to introduce her to the chicks? Or should we wait until they can join all three in the chicken pen at about 8 weeks?

And a second question about the chicks...we are really only planning to raise hens, but of course, we don't know for 100% certain that all of the chicks are hens. We went to a poultry breeders show today and saw roosters of both the Orpington and the Australorp, and boy are they impressive! If we do end up with a rooster, how many of our chicken's eggs would likely be fertilized? I know we can check to see if they are by candling (I think is what it's called) but am just wondering if we would be trading half of our breakfast eggs for fertilized eggs, or 10%, or 75%?

Well, there is absolutely NO difference in taste or nutrition between fertile and unfertilized eggs, in case that is what causes your concern. You could not see the evidence via candling unless the egg has been incubated for at least three days...

No chick develops in fertilized eggs which are not incubated, either artificially or under a broody hen. Most hens lay their eggs and leave the nest, don't go broody. So if you gather eggs daily, there will be no problem with partially-formed chicks. Or even every couple of days...

One should introduce new members of the flock when they are close to the same size, or, alternatively, the chicks are around twelve weeks old. From eight to twelve weeks of age, you could pen them next to ir inside your coop so the original, older hens see and hear the chicks but cant harm them. Cochins who are not in a broody state will not adopt chicks, so don't expect yours to be their Mama.

By the time they've seen everybody for a couple weeks, you can remove the barriers between them and integrate the flock.

Hello and welcome to BYC If you have roosters with your hens most of your eggs will be fertile. Roosters mate with the hens on a daily basis and the hens store the sperm, ensuring she lays fertile eggs for up to 2 weeks after a single successful mating. But as Gryeyes said there is no difference between fertile and fertile eggs, until you or the hen start incubating them, so don't let that put you off!